... when referring to a function's parameter or a struct/union's
member.
The idea of using FOO comes from the GNU coding standards:
The comment on a function is much clearer if you use the argument
names to speak about the argument values. The variable name
itself should be lower case, but write it in upper case when you
are speaking about the value rather than the variable itself.
Thus, "the inode number NODE_NUM" rather than "an inode".
Upcasing names is problematic for a case-sensitive language like C,
because it can create ambiguity. Moreover, it's too much shouting for
my taste.
GTK-Doc's convention to prefix the identifier with @ makes references
to variables stand out nicely. The rest of the GTK-Doc conventions
make no sense for us, however.
Signed-off-by: Markus Armbruster <armbru@pond.sub.org>
We seed it with value of time(). It's the traditional way, but it
provides only a few bits of effective entropy when an attacker has a
rough idea when the program started.
Instead, seed with a kernel random number. If we can't get one, fall
back to a hash of gettimeofday() and getpid(). This should happen
only on old systems or Windows. Far worse than a kernel random
number, but far better than using time().
Note that fairland used to seed with time() + getpid() until commit
331aac2a (v4.2.20) dropped the getpid(), claiming it didn't improve
the randomness. Perhaps it didn't under Windows then, but it
certainly did elsewhere, so it was a regression.
random() may yield different pseudo-random number sequences for the
same seed on another system. For instance, at least some versions of
MinGW provide a random() in -liberty that differs from traditional BSD
(see commit c8231b12). Rather inconvenient for regression testing.
MT19937 Mersenne Twister is a proven, high-quality PRNG. Actual code
is reference code provided by the inventors[*]. Quick tests show
performance comparable to random().
Like random(), MT is not cryptographically secure: observing enough of
its output permits guessing its state, and thus its future output. I
don't think players can do that.
Drop the copy of BSD random() we added for Windows.
Like the previous commit, this changes the server's die rolls, and
makes fairland create a different random map for the same seed. Update
expected smoke test results accordingly.
[*] mt19937ar.sep.tgz downloaded from
http://www.math.sci.hiroshima-u.ac.jp/~m-mat/MT/MT2002/emt19937ar.html
"random() % n" is sound only when n is a power of two. The error is
hardly relevant in Empire, because random() yields 31 bits, and our n
are always much smaller than 2^31. Fix it anyway.
Use smallest the 2^m >= n instead of n, and discard numbers exceeding
n.
Bonus: faster for me even in the worst case n = 2^m+1.
Like the recent change to damage(), this changes some of the server's
die rolls, only this time the effect is pretty pervasive. Worse,
fairland now creates a completely different random map for the same
seed. Update expected smoke test results accordingly.
Why upgrade? I'm not a lawyer, but here's my take on the differences
to version 2:
* Software patents: better protection against abuse of patents to
prevent users from exercising the rights under the GPL. I doubt
we'll get hit with a patent suit, but it's a good move just on
general principles.
* License compatibility: compatible with more free licenses, i.e. can
"steal" more free software for use in Empire. I don't expect to steal
much, but it's nice to have the option.
* Definition of "source code": modernization of some details for today's
networked world, to make it easier to distribute the software. Not
really relevant to us now, as we normally distribute full source code.
* Tivoization: this is about putting GPL-licensed software in hardware,
then make the hardware refuse to run modified software. "Neat" trick
to effectively deny its users their rights under the GPL. Abuse was
"pioneered" by TiVo (popular digital video recorders). GPLv3 forbids
it. Unlikely to become a problem for us.
* Internationalization: more careful wording, to harden the license
outside the US. The lawyers tell us it better be done that way.
* License violations: friendlier way to deal with license violations.
This has come out of past experience enforcing the GPL.
* Additional permissions: Probably not relevant to us.
Also include myself in the list of principal authors.
other. Ensure headers in include/ can be included in any order
(except for econfig-spec.h, which is special). New header types.h to
help avoid inclusion cycles. Sort include directives. Remove some
superflous includes.
